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March 2008 THIRD THURSDAY:
Wine Tasting
This month's Third Thursday was a very informative and highly
entertaining wine tasting, presented by Anne Richmond at her
beautiful home in Southport!
Anne led us through a brief history of
wine and wine making, including an
interesting look at the rise of wine
production in the United States.  
Everyone knows about California's
celebrated wineries, but did you
know that there are only three states
in the US that don't have productive
vineyards? (Don't ask me to recall
which ones.....I blame it on too much
tasting!)  We were also amused to hear that clever vintners "got away
Tasting Wine
For our tasting, the bottles were wrapped in brown bags and
identified only with a letter ("W" for white, "R" for red, and "P" for
pink) and a number.  We were given journals to make notes in, and
tips on how to assess the various qualities of the wines, including
clarity, color, sniff, flavor, complexity, and, most importantly,
whether or not we liked it!  To download the information pages
from our journals, click here, and to download a sample note page,
click here.  Click here for a brief description of some of the more
popular varietals.
Sherry Stocks found a new
favorite (l), while  Maureen
Dewire (r) gets the "sniff" on
something pinkish....
Anne shares some highlights from the
history of wine and wine making.
When the tasting was through, and all the notes were made, we
revealed each bottle so that everyone could note the names of the
ones they enjoyed (and the ones they didn't, for that matter!)
Tasters work their way through the blind tasting (l), as Anne diligently makes notes
in her wine journal (r)......
with sugar and yeast!

Everyone was asked to bring their favorite
under-$10 bottle of wine, and Anne walked
us through the finer points of tasting wine, and
distributed journals to make notes in before
with" distributing their product during
Prohibition by shipping concentrated
grape juice emblazoned with labels
Everyone was pleased to have
discovered at least one new (and
affordable!) wine to add to their "must
buy" lists, and Mark Deese (right) took
home a prize for correctly guessing just
about all of the different varietals.  

Cheers to all who participated, and a
huge "THANK YOU" to Anne for a
highly enjoyable evening!
"warning" the
recipients not to
combine the juice
letting us loose amongst the brown-bag disguised bottles for a blind
tasting.  (She also had some BEAUTIFUL cheese and bread trays for
us, with a wonderful array of cheeses.....perhaps a whole 'nother
Third Thursday in the making....?)